Nothing Familar Here Anymore
by notkayliefields
Summary: Asta only wanted one thing, instead she gets the one thing she never wanted.
1. Chapter 1

I poked my head out of the window and watched some of the older girls twirling around the cobblestone street. I found them so fascinating. Every day at exactly 5 pm they walked around the town with their blue skirts floating around them, eyes of the townspeople automatically getting stuck to them till they swayed out of sight. They were elegant and light, that's what I wanted; I wanted people to look at me dumbstruck by my grace and poise.

"Whatcha doin', little one?" I jumped and scurried back a few steps as if I had just been caught doing something bad.

The voice that spooked me came from my mother, a gorgeous woman that stuck in your mind, unlike myself, a plain little girl with frizzy brown curls and dull green eyes. my mum pulled the curtain aside and peered out to see what I had been peeping at.  
A knowing smile stretching her face "You want to be a Beauxbaton like your mum, dont you Asta!" she laughed, swooping down to grab me up into her arms and twirling me around, eliciting the high pitched giggle of a child from the back of my throat.

-

Six years later I'm finally old enough to attend my beloved Beauxbatons, but am I? Nope. My great aunt Is some sort of a professor at a school with some ridiculous name and my parents decided (without me might I add) that it would be better for me to attend that school. I knew in my head it was still a good school and I should be excited, but after so many years of being promised something I've always wanted I tend to get a bit pissy when I don't get it.

The uniforms were thick black wool robes instead of the soft flowy blue of the Beauxbaton uniform and it was three days travel just to get to the train station that would whisk me further and further away from my dream. 

After stomping angrily through the station, attracting cautious stares from bystanders, I stopped in front of platform 9 looking for the platform on her ticket "9 3/4" . There wasn't a platform, there was a just stupid wall this had to be a joke. I glared at the wall willing it to catch fire. My mum rushed through the crowd to catch up and my dad trailed , pushing a cart of my trunks and loose books in front of him. 

"See it doesn't even exist!" I waved my boarding pass in my mums face.  
Then a girl came hurtling at the wall full speed. I didn't even have time to gasp before the girl disappeared from sight without a sound. 

"You were saying?" my mum smirked at me. 

"I'm not doing it." I looked pointedly back and forth between my parents and the wall.

"You are if you want your teddy" my dad waved the raggedy bear that I had slept with since i was little, in the air. I snatched his hand out of the air looking around for witnesses. 

"Fine." I muttered through my teeth.

"I still don't get why I'm traveling around the world for a school when I have a better one in my backyard"

"Just trust us will you"

'mum makes ever so convincing arguments' I noted to myself 

I grabbed the cart and aimed for my certain doom, they'd regret this whole idea when I crashed into this dumb wall and earned myself a concussion" my mum placed a hand on my arm, "be good", she pecked my cheek. 

"Not likely." 

Then I took off, picking up speed and hitting the wall, or at least what used to be a wall. Now it was a sea of buzzing people making their way onto a shiny steam engine and waving goodbye to parents and younger siblings. 

I lugged my stuff into a warm compartment and plopped down across the seat, trying to take up as much space as possible, legs sprawled all willy nilly to indicate that i REALLY did not want to share. Not that it mattered, because a second later three boys opened the door to climb in for the trip, completely ignoring my scowl. A boy with darker skin tone smirked while the two red headed boys looked confused. 

"What are you doing?" the taller of the two red heads questioned me.  
They were insanely similar looking, other than their slight height only thing that distinguished them at all was that the taller ones eyes were just a shade lighter than the other ones (not that i was looking or anything). 

"Sitting" I wiggled my butt for emphasis. Honestly people theese days are sooo unobservant. 

The shorter one took this as his opportunity to pipe up. 

"But those are our seats." 

"Not anymore." I thought this was rather redundent considering I had done everything in the world to make sure that it looked like a 4'3 scrawny girl was taking up an entire train compartment, but still they all just stared at me kinda blankly. 

The short one shrugged, walked in anyway and sat across from me. The darker toned boy followed, sitting beside him, leaving Mr. Tall (not the most original nickname I know) standing there looking, at me expectantly. 

"Aren't you going to move your legs?"I rolled my eyes and slid them off the seat, making room for him. 

He plopped down, giving me a cocky grin. 

"Names Fred." He stuck out his hand expectantly. I just stared. He seemed to finally get I wouldn't be shaking it so he let it fall. 

"I'm George and this is Lee." The shorter red head said pointing, back and forth between him and the other boy. 

"Asta." I muttered, not really in the mood to talk. 

"what did you call me!" george mock angrily said.

"No my name is asta" I would be lying if I said I didn't at least crack a half smile at his attempt at a joke.

They left me alone them, chatting about boy things like quidditch pads and the frogs they had put in their siblings beds. 

"So, Asta, what year?" Lee asked out of nowhere giving me a quizzical look, well as quizzical as a boy with ears bigger than the rest of his body can. 

"First." 

"What house do you think you're going to get?" Fred asked. 

"We're Gryffindor." George added. 

I just shrugged, hoping they would go back to not talking to me. I knew it wasn't fair to be so rude to them but quite frankly I didn't care what house they were in or what sort of door they had. 

A trolley stopped in front of the compartments doors and a round head popped in "Anything for the trip dears?" a cheery woman asked, glancing around the room. Fred waved his hand. 

"Four chocolate frogs please." 

She handed them to him smiled and continued pushing the trolley down the narrow hallway. Fred passed Lee and George two of the frogs before handing me the other one. I took it carefully, like it was poisonous, (that would be smart on his part considering i kept scowling at him like i wanted to kill him, you know the whole attack before they attack you thing) but I offered him a thank you and a small smile. To be honest I was surprised. I hadn't done anything to make him want to be nice; in fact I had encouraged the opposite but here he was doing this like we were friends. I unwrapped the sweet and ate it (after just a bit of a struggle), the fudge melting on my tongue. I was prepared to go back to sitting quietly when a hand reached over and pulled my hand closer. Fred examined the crumpled wrapper I was holding then plucked out a slightly wrinkled card. 

He glanced up and smiled at me, "My brother collects these." He presented the card to me. 

"Nigyan Belivous," I read aloud he nodded 

"Famous wizards." he tucked the card in his trunk. 

"What's his name?" I asked. 

He looked startled for a second like; he hadn't expected her to continue talking to him. 

"I just said it didn't i, Nigyan Belivous are you daft ?" 

"I meant your brother you nit." 

"I have five, three older brothers; George, he jerked his thumb at his twin who was currently trying to avoid a noogie from his seat mate, and a younger one Ron, he collects the wizard cards". 

"Must be nice, I'm an only child, it gets lonely sometimes." He looked as if he was about to say something but then the train slowed down, screeching to a stop. 

"Time to go." George and Lee jumped up pulling, Fred out and off the train, leaving me to stumble outside on my own. 


	2. Chapter 2

Let me just start by saying I have never and will never be afraid of boats, but a very tiny boat holding an extremely large man and me is enough to make me pee myself. Nothing against him, it's not his fault that I had no ones boat to climb in leaving me wandering aimlessly around on the shore a good five minutes. If he hadn't glanced back right before they had set off I would probaly still be there, although right about now that sounded pretty good. My end of the boat wasnt even in the water he weighed the boat down so much I was floating and inch or two avove the lakes surface. If he wasn't adjusting his rather large body on that tiny seat in the front making the boat to rock violently, he was digging around in the oldest coat I have ever seen

He started twisting around in his seat to dig something out of one of his eight million pockets that was obviously burried so deep he practically needed a jack hammer to bust it out. I gave the side of the boat a death grip that would most likely leave indentations for the rest of it's sad little boat life. I couldn't see the shore of the lake or the bottom of it for that matter so I sure as hell wasn't about to fall in. Maybe I was just being bitter but something in me couldnt help but grump that this would never happen at beuxbatons

When I and rest of the first years were finally on solid ground, I promptly threw up in the sand. I had assure my boat mate and apparetly grounds keeper I was okay and that I just needed a few minutes to not feel like i was dying, I encouraged him to get a head start on me and I'd be there soon enough. I think he might have argued but the smell wasn't pleasent and the others were making overdramatic faces to clarify their feelings on the situation, as if there were any question.

'Nothing like making memories' I thought to myself before I proceeded to spew my guts out on the sand again. And can i say the sequal is never as good as the original. 

When I finally caught up to the rest of the first years that hadn't been busy coughing their brains up on the beach, I saw the woman with a severe bun and withering glance; more specifically my aunt. we aren't exactly close, I had only met her once or twice years before but she had a very distinct look; hawk eyed, always watching for mistakes, the kind of look that's hard to forget. I knew instantly who she was another thing i knew as soon as i saw her was that she wasn't happy with me.

"and where were you young lady"

It seriously wasn't fair I mean how is it my fault I got sea sick?! I didn't chose that boat I DIDN'T EVEN CHOOSE THIS SCHOOL FOR HEAVENS SAKE! But did I voice this particular thought with auntie dearest? no, no I did not, In fact I didn't actually have to say anything at all because after a few seconds of me opening and closing my mouth mutely she turned around and opened large wooden doors leading from the muggy hallway we were all currently bunched up into an obnoxiously loud and horribly bright room. I realizes that the term "room" is terribly unspecific but to be fair at first it was so bright even calling it a room was a guess. For all i knew we were walking right off the edge of a cliff into some sort of school spirit volcanoe. Sacrafice the weak for good luck and all that jazz.

We entered the room which I now realized was less of a room more a dining hall with long oak tables crammed full of students in the standard black wool robes, this I noted was where the deafening roar was coming from, however much of this roar i must note appeared to be coming from all the way across the length of hte hall. Two ginger heads were bounding around on top the benches stepping between peoples knees to bend down nonchalently to talk to their friends. Call me what you like but I had a feeling if I had to guess whos flaming mops thoses were I'd be right. 

"Line up" my aunt ordered us tearing my gaze away from the ginger monsters. I suppose this was a reasonable request considering there was no way to get through the tables in our current mass. However this didn't comfort me at all as i was jabbed and shoved by scrawny arms and pointy elbows. All their shoving had me turned around and confused, when I finally managed to right myslef i found (ever sooo much to my delight might I add) that I had been shoved all the way to the front of our crooked line. I'm not nervous in front of people, but I think the thousand or so faces staring in my direction might have been a just a little nerve racking considering the light headedness that was sweeping over me.

I might have actually fainted at the idea of leading the munchkin parade across the hall (that was now significantly longer), however we will never know because my aunt decided to take mercy on my poor sould. She stepped to my side giving a slight nod before leading the way through the sea of curious faces. It wasn't exactly smooth sailing making my way down the asile between two tables, I must've stumbled over my own feet four times before reaching the elevated table at the end of the four student tables, but nonetheless I made it. So I stood there with my heart beating wildly like it was trying to burst free of my ribcage while an older student brought out a stool and placed it in the center of the platform in front of the teachers table.

I let my eyes wonder between them, some sat upright giving stolid glares at students across the hall, others casually slumped back quietly joking with their table companions. One however at the very end turned to meet my gaze, she had shocking white hair against deeply tanned skin. The white hair didn't seem to be from age, whatever it was about her it made my blood run cold. My skin errupted into goosebumps, we must have been staring at each other for sometime now but she made no move to break eye contact. If I could have I would have, hell if I could have I wouldve run straight back down the asile and out the door, But her even gaze kept me frozen in place.

Then in walked a different student carrying and old beaten up hat, catching the white haired womans attention and setting me free from my frozen state. The gawky teenage boy gentely set dow the frayed brown hat the hurried off long limbs taking him as fast as possible. This was when I knew my parents had made a terrible mistake, because as soon as the hat had been set down a hush fell over the room. If something can silence a room of a thousand or more teenagers you know it's a big deal, and not to be rude but if a patched up old wizards hat the color of rotten wood was awe inspiring I was terrified to see the dormitories.

Then the hat's fold's seperated almost as if it had a mouth and started singing... Now, I was raised in the wizarding world, I was very used to weird things happening on a daily basis but not once in my life has a hat sang to me, a potted plant? yes, an enchanted birthday cake? yes, but a hat? 'fraid not. When it finished with its little tune (which was very clever what i understood of it, but what a huffledor was i had no idea), the room burst into applause and a man with a rather long white beard and bright eyes rose from his seat, silencing the room once again. 

"Welcome to Hogwarts!" He nodded at the first years, "When your name is called you will be sorted into one of the four houses, Gryffindor, the brave and daring, Hufflepuff, the loyal and patient, Ravenclaw, the witty and knowledgeable, or Slytherin, the cunning and resourceful. Let's begin, shall we"? He gestured to Aunt Minerva to begin. 'Obviously a man a few words'. 

"Amanda Bernsherger." 

A slight chubby girl with short blonde hair came forward and sat on the stool as the previously singing hat was placed on her head. Her round little face pulled an expression that could only be described as uncomfortable. I couldn't help but wonder if it was because of the crowd staring straight at her that was making her face flush or if she was just uncomfortable with the fact that a singing hat was now on top of her head supposedly determining here fate at the school somehow. 

"Hmm interesting," the hat said, "but I think it'll be Hufflepuff!" 

A table in the middle clapped politley as she rushed to it, eager to not be the focus of attention anymore. It went on like that for a while, a few kids sitting with Slytherin, one or two with Gryffindor; they were just being scattered about as far as I could tell and as the group was shrinking I started getting butterflies in my stomach. 

"Asta Runall." I looked up at my aunt hoping to see some out of charecter sort of encouragement but she was just staring ahead expressionless. 

I timidly aproached the stool before clambering up proping my feet on one of the rungs. The hat was plopped unceremoniously on top my head. It was silent for a good minute or two and I was scared I had managed to brake it somehow. Then out of nowhere it very confidently cried out;

"Ravenclaw!"

I got the same polite applause from my new house as all the other new students but from the far left there was a series of boos from someone else voicing their feelings on the matter. 

"No fair we wanted her!" Fred and George cried out at the same time, Lee just added a shout of agreement. 

Not knowing what to do, I just ignored their commentary and went to join some of the other first years at the Ravenclaw table; two boys, one rather chunky and smiley with dark brown curls and the other of average stature with sandy blond hair. I sat down by a girl with curly blond hair to her shoulders and bright green eyes. 

"Asta." I stuck out my hand to the girl. 

"Emily." the girl grabbed my hand eagerly and shook it, a warm smile spreading across her face. 

"This is insane, isn't it?" Emily said, pointing at the food, the decorations, the ghosts floating around and the starry ceiling. I was eager for a friend and i had a creeping suspicion that complaining of it not being to beaxbaton standard wouldnt earn me any points. 

"It is." a voice not belonging to me replied.I looked the other direction and saw the owner of the interrupting voice was the boy with sandy blond hair. 

"Names Gregory," he offered with a cheeky smile, stretching his hand across me to shake emily's hand "and this is Thomas." he said jerking his head at the chunky boy who just waved. 

The feast went well on late into the night, when course after course of food (which admittedly was some of the most delicious i've ever had) had finally been shoved into our stomachs; the entire school waddled out of the grand hall with their houses. An older kid walked us to the stairs and instructed us to be careful, the the staircases changed direction frequently and quite often resulted in missing students. I lagged behind the group a little despite the warning, I didn't know if it was from my earlier sickness or all the food I had just engulfed but I could feel myself turning green. Pausing I kneeled down for a second to compose myself but when I looked up the rest of my house was gone. though I suppose the more accurate statment was that I was gone. While I was caught up in my sick spell, the staircase had moved and it now led off into a dark corridor.

Faced with the option of riding the staircase carousel for the rest of the night or getting off while I had the chance, I peeled myself off the staircase and onto the still landing so I wouldn't be moved any further away from where I had last seen my house. I heard a shuffling down the corridor and wandered down a bit to see if I could find someone who could help me but it turned out to just be a cat; a scruffy beady eyed cat that hissed at me and then tore off down the corridor, Obviously no use as far as navigating my way back to my house went but if I ever need to scare off small children that cat was deffinitely up for the job.

I turned to make my way back to the staircases but then a bone rattaling boom shook the corridor followed by a smell so strong my eyes watered hit my nose, I started coughing my body shaking uncontroably trying to rid my lungs of the noxious fumes. In my fit I could faintly hear yelling and saw flashes of red shooting behind my eyes. As the smell slowly went away my eyes cleared and I saw a frantic George yelling in my face but I couldn't hear anything, my ears were still ringing.

"what the heck is wrong with you!" I collapsed onto the floor still shaken and dizzy from breathing in the fumes, Fred knelt down, checking to see if I was alright. If I was stable enough I would have slapped him so hard across the face George felt it to.

"We thought you were someone else, sorry."

'as if that made it better' I humphed to myself

"Who offended you enough that you'd do that to?" I yelled at them, less because I was angry more because I still couldnt hear well enough to speak at a normal volume.

"Filch, the schools caretaker, we didn't think it would be that strong."

"You're insane! The only other person on this floor is some cat!"

"That's Filch's cat Mrs. Norris and if she's here he's not far behind, we need to go." George piped up from behind Fred. So that's the story on how in my first three hours at this wretched school I ended up running from a cat.

Fred slid his arm around me and slung me over his back in a less than gentle fashion, then thundered up the staircase after his brother only stopping when they reached a brightly lit hall where he and George halted by a portrait of a rather plump lady dressed in a bright pink taffeta dress. Fred set me down easily before turning to the pink lady.

"Snorgel snout." He said only slightly out of breath the painting swung open to reveal a warm room draped in deep red tapestries with lamps flickering all about.

"Where were you, we were worried you got caught!" Lee jumped up off the arm of an overstuffed chair that he was slung across a second ago.

"Technical difficulties, but on the bright side the gas blow works!" George said walking over and flopping down on the chair Lee had vacated seconds ago.

The portrait swung open once more, revealing my Aunt Minerva who looked calmly acround the room before catching a glimpse of me most likely still shaking and a lovley shade of green. Her face went from relaxed to supprised then back to stolid gaining control of herself so fast I wondered if I had imagined her suprise at all. I attempted a little half wave in a "there is nothing weird about this situation at all I'm totally supposed to be here" kinda way but I think it just came across in a "why yes I do look like I'm about to die but dont worry I'll do it on the tile for easy clean up" way.

"Why aren't you in your house?"

"She got lost." Fred offered in way of explanation, and to be fair it was a decent excuse I mean for christ sake the staircases play hot potato with students.

"Well come along, I'll return you." She turned around and briskly left.

I offered a little smile to the boys and then rushed after her, no way was I getting lost again next time someone would probablly attack me with acid.


End file.
